Saturday, March 17, 2012

“It takes me six beers to reach the level, and from there I can start to enjoy myself”, he brags

“Son when you can fit in my pants you can tell me what to do” he says tipping another wine cooler on the drive to Idaho.

“Here is a twenty, go play video games and leave me alone to sleep” he slurs just before passing out in an Arlington parking lot.

“You drive Chris, your old enough” he says to his nine year old son on a Canadian highway after too much whisky.

“Ok Jenny, our hands are in your life” he says to his eleven year old daughter on the same day on the same Canadian highway miles further on.

“I was working, I have to work long hours” he tells his son and daughter after only seeing them for a few hours the entire week of Christmas break.

…………..

“I wasn’t on a business trip when you came for your visit on spring break, I was at a treatment center quitting drinking”

“I am so sorry for the things that I did while drinking, the time I should have spent with you and your sister on Christmas break I was doing coke and drinking” his words to his ten year old son.

“When I told you real men don’t cry, I was wrong, that was probably the worst advice I have ever given you”

“I’m sorry you have to keep doing this to yourself son. I love you, but you can no longer live with me” he says to his overdosed nineteen year old son.

“I understand more than you think, I’m the only one in this car that’s sober” he says to his delusional twenty year old son.

“If all you have is God you’re fucked; if all you have is AA you’re fucked”

“When someone refers to themselves as an alcoholic I don’t need any more explanation, I understand the suffering, torment, and the pain they experienced. No more explanation is necessary, I understand”

“My name is Scott and I’m an alcoholic, and I have sixteen years sober today”

Dad got sober twenty five years ago today, march seventeenth nineteen eighty seven. I got the opportunity to know him drunk and I got the gifts from him being sober. I hear a lot of opinions from people about AA who are not alcoholics, or heard rumors from someone that it doesn’t work, or that the people in AA all whine about not being able to drink anymore, and my favorite is that they are all just weak people. If you knew Dad, weak would be the last word you would use to describe him.

Twenty five years ago today I got to hear the last lie due to my father’s alcoholism and drug addiction. That “business trip” was the start of the rest of his life. On St Patty’s day nineteen eighty seven dad came to wearing a pair of green bootees and never drank again.

Happy twenty fifth dad, love your son.

Chris McQueeney 3/17/12 12:59 P.M.

Here is my submission for FF55 at Mister know it all, This is a poem with exactly 55 words

It had to have been October. As I think about it, it was October just before my twentieth birthday. I was walking in one of my favorite parks in Oregon, we called it the bluff, Promenade Park. The park starts at the top of singer hill and runs atop of the first level of cliffs in Oregon City. A good portion of the park is over the paper mill. At night when the mill is operational the lights and the steam are eerily beautiful.

I had been homeless for some time and I was running out of safe places to hole up. I had been breaking into peoples garages during the day to have a place to lie down out of the weather, summer was over. The few places that were undercover that I had gone to during the times at night when I would try to sleep had started to be watched by the police.

The drugs weren’t working, I couldn’t stay awake anymore. Not surprising I had been awake for over a week. I needed to find a place to sleep. First place I tried was this little park across from the library; it had a bathroom with a covered patio. It was raining so hard and I was grateful that it was covered. Finally, a covered place to lie! I closed my eyes and I tried to get to sleep but I kept hearing someone whispering. Consuming a large amount of speed over an extended length of time can cause paranoia and hallucinations. I started becoming convinced that the people living next to the park were watching me…so no sleep there.

By that time the rain had let up so I shuffled over to the Catholic Church, they had a park bench that you couldn’t see from the road. I got to the spot and found that the bench wasn’t too wet and that it was blocked from most of the wind. Getting comfortable was difficult but I did and was almost asleep when the sky opened up. Everything got soaked, my cloths, and my sleeping bag. I couldn’t stay there so I moved on.

I don’t understand the logic that led me to the bluff but I soon found myself wandering up and down the path. My body hurt so much. I kept walking through spider webs, whether they were there or not I am not sure. Feeling spiders crawling all over me was fucking creepy.

I stopped and looked at the mill and the beautiful lights and thought why, why keep going? A few months before I had reached out for professional help and been rejected, and shamed, my father had tried to help me but I was too sick for him to be successful, why go on? As I stood there cold, wet, homeless, and hopelessly addicted to drugs, I thought for the first time in my life about killing myself, throwing myself over the edge of the cliff to dash against the train tracks below.

At that time I felt I had no reason to live anymore, I wasn’t living. I have no Idea why I didn’t jump, I had decided to. And I am sure I would have but from one moment to the next my whole perception changed, and I wandered on.

Chris McQueeney 3/15/12 4:32 PM

This has been submitted to dversepoets.com. Where they have asked to have the holes filled in behind the poetry. Please feel free to check out what the other poets have offered.

Sunday, March 11, 2012

We had been walking for about fifteen minutes. I had no problem with that, but she seemed to feel the need to reassure me. It was cute in a way, but completely unnecessary.The truck was about a mile and a half back, parked at the edge of the Thompson’s field.

This has always been one of my favorite areas to explore, and she knew it. I love the way the fields and the woods interact. The small fuzzy margins where it isn’t field and not quite woods just felt right to me.

I hadn’t seen Kristi for months. Then she shows up on my step this morning looking nervous, excited, and very beautiful. “Hi Cal, I know it’s early, and we haven’t talked in months, but I need some help and you are the only person I can trust” I have always had a soft spot for a damsel in distress, and it didn’t hurt that she was just about a ten in my book, petite, slim, blond pixy cut hair, and a face that was angular without being severe. And her voice, sexy and sweet at the same time…God she does it for me!

Before she started talking I knew I knew I would do whatever she asked of me, I always had. And I don’t regret it! I have had people ask me before why I let her do what she does to me, and my answer has always been “it was worth it”.

“I’ve missed you, and I…” she starts to say then stops herself abruptly. “There isn’t much time, will you help me?” she asks after a heavy pause.

“Of course, I’ll help you Kristi. You know that I will always be here for you”

“I found something at the Johnson’s place that I need to show you”

“Ok, let’s go. What did you find?” I shot over my shoulder as I went to the kitchen to get the keys to the truck.

“You will have to trust me; I don’t have the words to describe it.” As I came back into the room she smiled nervously and continued, “You’ll see when we get there”. With that she put her arms around me and laid her head on my chest. “I knew I could count on you Cal, only you.”

Those words felt so good. I had been waiting months for them. She broke the embrace and walked to the truck and got in. That was how things went with us, always straight to it.

“Just ahead” she says her voice strained as she climbs over a fallen tree. “Do you see how it looks like the trees form a cave?” just ahead it did look sort of like a wooded cave, the trees and grass formed a cavity about ten feet across that narrowed the further back it went.

“Yeah I see”

“That is where it is, towards the back. Go see and tell me what you think” she sounded very excited, but her face looked worried.

So I walked forward, down the small incline. At first the branches were well above my head but about twenty feet into the trees they started to get uncomfortably close. A few feet further the strangest feeling overcame me. It felt like I was walking through vertigo filled glue. I tried to turn around and cry for help when the world fell out from beneath me.

The last thing I remember is seeing Kristi through the field grass that was somehow growing up around my head. She was smiling, and it was the coldest thing I have ever seen.

“I knew I could count on you Cal, she said as the world went dark, “I knew”.

You’re destroying yourself my sister tried to say after barfing on her porch

On the Y2K

I can’t remember how December 31 1999 started off, but at some point I started drinking. I think I started the day off with a pint of DeKuyper 100 proof peppermint schnapps. I ended up at the bar down the road from my sister’s house. I drove. Under the seat was another pint o the 100 proof waiting for the ride home. I arrived at the bar and the first thing I did was get a long island ice tea. It couldn’t have been later than six or seven. A friend of mine was the bar tender and he kept comp-ing me shots of aftershock and various other liquor concoctions…all night. I lost count of how much I drank but it was a lot even for me. The whole night everyone was arguing about Y2K. I didn’t give a shit. I had plenty to drink, people to talk to, and a hot blond that was interested in every conversation I was in! The blond and I brought the New Year in with a very good kiss. She got up on a pool table and offered me her hand. No one said anything so I thought what the hell, and joined her. With free Champaign everyone in the bar cheered to the New Year. The kiss lasted for a minute or more, and looking back I am pretty sure that she had different ideas about how the night was going to end than what actually happened. I wished her a happy New Year, gave her another quick kiss, got down from the pool table, and promptly forgot about her. The drink was calling my name. I stayed until the bar closed and drove back to my sisters, drinking the extra pint the whole way. I got out of the car and lit up a smoke and proceeded to barf all over the front porch. I had a good fucking time that night. Six days later I was homeless and sitting in that same bar wondering what the fuck I was going to do….

Chris McQueeney3/11/121:51 AM

The inspiration for the poem and post were brought to you by dVerse 1999

Note to reader:
I don't Drink anymore, and the days leading up to Y2K and the seven days after I did some very shameful things, things that I don't like to talk about so much. You might say "wow puking all over your sister's porch, or driving your sister's car drunk, or being so obsessed with alcohol that you passed up a chance to have a memorable experience with a very beautiful woman (and she was hot, very hot)are pretty shameful". And you would be right, but the things I didn't write about were worse. I will write about some of that on my blog, and some will be in my book.

Saturday, March 10, 2012

Today it has been five months without a cigarette! No smoking at all. In about ten more days it will have been five months without nicotine (I wore the patch for about ten days, fucking things burnt the shit out of me) after twenty seven years of smoking I have quit! I am at peace with life without smoking. And I am happy to say that I am starting to get over some of the issues that my body threw at me as the result of quitting. I am not a reformist when it comes to things like this, the world has enough of those...I just couldn't handle the thought of smoking one more day.

Sunday, March 4, 2012

This was my impression when I walked into her cubical, lower. In front of her I felt lower then dirt. Lower then I had ever felt before. She sat behind her desk, like it separated her world from mine, a queen waiting for supplication from a lowly peasant. Her hair was meticulous, as was the rest of her appearance.

I sat and straight off she started with the questions. At first each one was different, but that soon changed. Over and over she asked the same question in a different way. I answered honestly. I answered true. The look on her face turned slowly from disdain to horror. Lower and lower I felt as the look in her eyes got more disturbed.

After what seemed like an hour of her uncomfortable questions, the look of judgment and horror and disdain growing throughout, she put down her pen and said something that crushed me in a small way, and angered me in a huge way! How dare she! I bare myself to her humiliating process and she does this to me.

“You are a garbage can user” she says with no shame….

Looking back with an older and more experienced perspective, I have a different view on this than I did at the time.

This woman was an intake counselor at a long term hardnosed drug and alcohol treatment center. “All alcoholics and drug addicts lie” a friend of mine likes to say. For all intense purposes this is true. The questions she asked me were about my drug and alcohol use. I had turned twenty about a month before and I had, three days before the interview, been released from an eleven day stay at a low, end of the road, detox center.

My first impression, the one that told me she was judging, weighing, and viewing me with disdain was probably accurate. All drug addicts lie, and she was prepared for my lies. The dawning look of horror that I misinterpreted was due to the fact that she was coming to understand that I was not lying. The things that I did to myself were horrendous, and I was a late stage drug addict at an age where most people are just beginning to cut the apron strings…

Chris McQueeney3/4/12 12:32 PM

Last night I went to a Birthday party for my sister at my Step-mother's house. My Step-mother is more of a mother to me than my "real" mom. The conversation got arround to my writing and she started telling me that when I write about my childhood and the things that happened to me it breaks her heart, and she started crying. "We didn't know" she said. This is directed to my family, you gave me everything you could based on the information you had. You are an amazing family and I am lucky to have you...

Friday, March 2, 2012

I watch him pick up something shiny, maybe a coin. Lucky bastard! It’s been at least two days, at least, since I found that partial pouch. I started off the same way he did, Chiclets! Things were good in those days. I even had ten or fifteen Chiclets dispensers around the city, and on the Upper East Side I had the wealthy buying chicks in bulk, scoops at a time! No twists for them, or me.

The summer of 99’, that was the fucking year for me! I had upped my distribution by forty percent. My wealthy customers were handing coin over like it was burning their hands. I even had a contract to be the sole supplier for Jones Mart. I was forced to get a bigger tub to carry my supply from drop to drop. That was my summer, and my city, Caledonia Oh.

By the end of 99’ the ball was in my court and I was sinking shots left and right. I thought I was ready, ready to move up to the big leagues. Big League Chew had just hit the scene. That first time I tried it was amazing. No crunchy shell to deal with, and being in a foil sealed bag never again did I have to worry about its age…smooth and soft every time.

That was twelve years ago. My rise was meteoric, the fall was titanic! I thought because I had been swimming in Chiclets that the Big League would be no challenge. Fifteen pouches a day, yes fifteen, was where I topped out. I started losing track of my deliveries, and my client base started dwindling. The pull of the Big League was strong. Even my wealthy clients couldn’t keep up. Jones Market pulled out and I was done, I just didn’t know it. On Friday I picked up a fat delivery, by Monday it was gone and I needed to re-up. But my supplier didn’t answer my calls, or my pages.

My personal stash held out for three weeks. Like I said that was twelve years ago, and I haven’t even been able to pick myself up yet. He must think it’s hard to make it back from being a twist…hoapfully he'll never have to experience getting out of the pouch. Lucky bastard!

Caledonia Harold Press3/2/12

Man found dead in Jones Mart

By Jim Seltsman

At five thirty am this morning local man Tobias

Laufner was found dead inside the fifteenth

street Jones Mart. Our sources in the police

department are claiming that Laufner was

surrounded by empty pouches of original

flavor Big League Chew. Laufner has apparently

succumbed to a long time battle with the pouch.

His family has declined to comment.

Under cover surveillance photo of black market Big League sales

*The above story and newspaper article are works of fiction. Any resemblance to actual people or places is coincidental*

Photo courtesy of Bing images

By Chris McQueeney3/2/1211:13 PM

This piece was penned in response to a post by a very talented and entertaining author by the name of Ben Ditty. Here is a link to his post on Nice Old Spiceenjoy!